Background:Tobacco dependence treatment in clinical settings is of prime public health importance, especially in the Albanian population, as more than 23% (41% male and 5.6% female) are daily smokers. This study sought to examine the characteristics of tobacco users among university students and document rates of tobacco treatment delivery in Vlora, Albania.

Design/Methods:A cross-sectional study was conducted (May-July 2017) among students of University of Vlora, Albania. Students who agreed to participate in the study, completed a self-reported questionnaire, part of which was based on the Global Adult Tobacco Survey (GATS). Students from all Faculties and all semesters were randomly selected before each course. Statistical analyses were conducted with SAS 9.1.

Results:In total 1360 students participated (73% female) with 18% (n=234) of them being daily smokers. The majority of the smoker participants (81.0%) reported living with their family or a roommate, 45.5% of which are also smokers. Most of the smokers (62.7%) were willing to quit smoking within the next 6 months while the 62.0% had made at least one attempt to quit smoking during the last 12 months. Doctor’s advice appears to be an important motivation to quit for the majority of smokers (73.0%), yet of those visited a doctor (39.0%) within the same year, 70.9% were Asked about their smoking behaviour, 53.3% were Advised to quit, 33.8% were offered Assistance with quitting, 21.1% were offered help to set a quit date and 22.4% Arranged a follow-up meeting with the doctor.

Conclusions:Our study showed that although the advice of a doctor is a strong influence for young adults in quitting smoking, not all of them are asked about their smoking status or advised to quit as it is strongly recommended by all international guidelines for treating tobacco dependence. New interventions targeted on evaluating the effectiveness of well-designed training programmes in influencing tobacco treatment outcomes in healthcare settings in Albania are necessary.